Today, the 7th Sunday after Easter, is the Christian Festival of Pentecost or Whitsun.
There are many elements to this festival, perhaps more than any other Holy Day in Christianity. What does each element mean? Not just for the telling of the story, but the meaning to your soul?
My thoughts today will center on the meaning of otherness for your soul. Otherness is the true blessing, the most significant element of the Pentecostal experience.
If you have been reading my posts or taking any courses in the Imagine Self Academy, you already know that I am always looking at the intimately personal, to the experience of I.
Collective, tribal traditions are beautiful. Sharing beliefs and participating in communal celebration of those beliefs can be heart-warming and soul-nurturing, but for most, these are about the experience of we, not the experience of I
For decades, I have been devoted to Selfhood, to move the experience of I into a greater clarity, a fulfilling potential of amazing complexity. The greatest aspect of Creation is the mystery of Selfhood and Otherness.
I love individuality, more than I love identification with and belonging to a group. Have you thought about this?
This is why I love Pentecost. It is the festival of the awakened I, the flame of Self…this comes first. Then the awakened self, awakens to the the self of the other as an individual, not as a fellow member of the tribe. Differences become more wonder-full than similarities.
Pentecost celebrates caring, not sharing.
Pentecost celebrates listening, not speaking.
Pentecost encourages understanding of the other, not declaring of the self or the group.
Pentecost reveres the uniqueness of the other, not the sameness.
The Pentecostal Flame of the Holy Spirit is the flame of the self fully possessed that can then split into two dancing flames…the flame of self and the flame of other, the twin flames of sacred conversation.
I also find great joy in seeing the twin flames as Freedom and Love, both transcending the comforts of familiar stories, pleasures, attachments and alignments.
Pentecost is not about a celebration of an event. Pentecost asks us to attend to our sacred conversations with others.
Sacred conversations celebrate and honor the kingdom, the power, and the glory of otherness. Remember, in awakening selfhood we find our own otherness.
Reread my thoughts and spend some sacred time contemplating the Pentecostal blessings of otherness.
